Thick As Thieves
by Anime Girl23
Summary: Neal Cassidy died in Storybrooke, but he woke up in Portland. The price of magic and his father's spell over the town split him off from his family and he was left with the world's best thieves; hitter, hacker, and the only other thief Archie ever trained. They promised to get him home. Neal/Emma [Swanfire], subtly implied Hardison/Parker/Eliot OT3


**Spoilers:** AU post-Quiet Minds (OUAT). Post-series (Leverage).

Disclaimer: Neither OUAT nor Leverage belong to me.

Thick As Thieves  
One-shot

The fact of it all was that Neal Cassidy was a thief and had been since he esDidcaped Neverland.

He had still been fourteen when he got out, not even sure just how long he'd been there, but knowing it had been long enough, because the world had changed. That the world that he had barely had time to know when he was taken from the Darlings' home had changed. It had gotten more brutal, he thought. More cutthroat and more broken.

Broken like him if he looked in a mirror too long and broken like the blonde girl Archie had brought back with him, years after he'd met the other man.

Parker.

He had never gotten her full story. Never knew where she was from or even what her name actually was. If it was Parker. If that was a first name or a last. He never knew, but when it came down to who they were as a pair, it didn't matter. They were thieves, plain and simple. He worked alone and so did she, unless they were together. Their little exception that neither of them had ever talked about. That they _couldn't_ talk about, because Parker had never been good with words, but a simple _wanna go steal something_ was probably the closest he would ever get to her saying she wanted him around.

Archie had called them family—screwed up as they were—one day as he taught them the careful art of weaving through laser grids. Called Parker and him siblings in a way that was meaningful and strange at the same time.

That was the first time he ever saw Parker cry, curled up in a ball after she'd run out and apologizing to someone that wasn't him even though he'd been the only one with her. A part of her past, he'd told himself. Something she hadn't been ready to face or talk about.

"You don't have to call me your brother," he had offered as he pushed her hair out of her face. She had never replied to him, but there had been some strange understanding. Some moment of realization that came when she called Archie their dad—never to his face, though—and he'd stiffened. Loss. They'd both lost people and replacing them… They couldn't do it.

Parker called Archie dad, but he never did.

He called Parker his sister, but he knew she'd never call him her brother.

Loss.

Acceptance.

The thing about it was that life went on, though, even after the loss and the acceptance. You keep growing and you move on as best you can. He told himself that when he left Archie and the pseudo-family the man had given him for close to ten years. Told himself that as he left Parker to finish out her training and reminded her to call him if she ever needed help on a job. Told himself that as he set out on his own for the first time since Archie caught him trying to hotwire his first car and took him under his wing.

Life goes on.

Finding Emma.

Losing Emma in the name of her own destiny.

Finding Emma again.

Finding out about Henry.

Losing Henry to the grandfather that made his dad look normal.

Losing Emma and Henry at once.

It didn't seem fair, the amount of times he had lost someone he loved. His mother. His papa. Emma. Henry. So many times and so many fights to stay hidden or to get someone back. Trying to find the happy ending that had gotten stolen from him long before the first curse ever existed.

Wondered if, maybe, he just wasn't meant to have one.

Wondered it even more as he lay in Emma's arms and, God, he knew he was dying then. Knew it as he gave her back the keychain that he had never let go of and told her to find her Tallahassee. Find her home, even if it couldn't be with him, no matter how much he wished it was. Couldn't be, though. Not with the life fading out of him, all because he had dived at the first chance to bring his father back.

Research, Archie had taught them. Always do your recon and think. Never let your emotions lead you. Let your head do that.

He hadn't led with his head, though. It had been his heart, pure and simple and so storybook that it _hurt_.

Everything hurt, even as his vision faded out and he let go. Every bit hurt. Emma. His papa.

The knowledge that he wouldn't get to keep his promise to Henry.

" _This isn't over. I'll see both of you again."_

Both, he'd said, but he only saw Emma.

Maybe that was why everything hurt so much.

"Back to earth, man."

Neal's head shot up, his eyes wide. Had he drifted off again? Judging from the looks he was getting, he was pretty sure he did. Oops. "Sorry," he mumbled, sighing as he ran his hand through his hair. Reminded himself for the thousandth time that he wasn't there anymore. He wasn't dying in Emma's arms while his papa hovered like the end of some tragic love story. Not anymore. He was alive, somehow, and he'd get Parker to tell him how one day. Get her to explain how he'd gone from where he'd been to a bed in Portland. Hell, get her to explain how she knew anything at all, but if he had ever known one thing about Parker, it was that she had ways. She always had some way of knowing things she shouldn't and it never made sense.

He'd spent most of the time they knew each other trying to figure out if she was from somewhere else. He wouldn't be surprised and, honestly, he hadn't ruled out Wonderland.

He rubbed a hand over his face as he focused back on the screens Hardison had laid out in front of them. Stared between pictures and maps and… Wait. "This isn't a job," he said, frowning.

"That's-"

"Storybrooke," Parker finished, still managing to sound bored, even as she bounced in her seat. She sort of bounced out of it more than stood as she went over to the screens, pointing at a spot that actually _was_ just forest. "We said we'd get you home."

They had. When he'd woken up to see Parker perched on a dresser, playing with Emma's dream catcher—the one he _knew_ he'd left in New York—and not giving him a single answer, she had said that they'd get him home. He had never been able to get an explanation out of any of them about how they knew, except for Eliot giving him a blank look and _it's Parker_.

He turned his eyes towards the blonde again, skeptical that she could figure any of this out or that any of them could, but her face softened and she shrugged. "You need your family," she said, like it was all the reason in the world and maybe it was. For him and for Parker, because she finally understood what it was like to have a family. He'd seen her fight for them. Saw her run back into a fight when she'd been home free because Eliot hadn't been. Saw her jump into a character she didn't even know because Hardison had gone too far with the con _again_. They were family, fractured as they were without Nate and Sophie around, but holding themselves together. Fighting the good fight that he had only started fighting with them when he woke up in the apartment above the microbrewery.

Hardison shrugged. "And if we can't figure out a way around the magic, we can have Eliot punch it."

Eliot turned half-irritated eyes towards the taller man and beckoned him over with a finger. "Come over here. I'll practice on you."

"You don't need no more practice. You break concrete."

He sat back as they bickered, watching and kind of wishing that he could have just fit in with this group. Wished he could have just settled down here, because they were good people. A few years ago, maybe he would have. Before he knew about Henry and before he'd seen Emma again, maybe he could have fit in with this little band of thieves, but he couldn't. Not now. This wasn't his life anymore. He'd always be a thief, but this wasn't his place and as much as he cared for them, they weren't the people he needed to be with.

Parker sat down next to them and he reached out to give her arm a little squeeze. "You guys don't have to do this," he said, his voice low. "It's not your fight."

"It's yours."

"I know. That's what I-"

"Family helps," she said. "That's what we do." He didn't know if she meant _we_ as in the team or the two of them, but she flashed him a small smile and he was pretty sure it was the latter. He squeezed her arm again, in thanks this time. "Besides, Eliot wants to play with magic swords."

"There's nothing magic about the swords."

"Don't tell him that." She frowned. "Are there mages? Hardison wants to meet a mage."

"Not exactly," he said, but the halfway answer seemed to satisfy her enough and she went to split the boys up before Eliot actually _did_ start practicing on Hardison's face. He turned to his phone as she did, typing out a text that he knew wasn't going to get a reply.

 _Almost home._

He hit send, his bottom lip between his teeth as he stared at the string of messages, every last one from him. He didn't know if the number was still active or if the new life Regina had given Emma had included new phones, but it was the only one he knew and the only one Hardison could find any record of. No Skype. No email. It was like she didn't exist outside of the fake life she'd left when she and Henry went back to Storybrooke.

Still, it made him feel better to send it, hoping against hope that she'd see them somehow. See them and the video message he'd sent to tell her he was okay. That he was going to make it back.

" _I'll see both of you again."_

Promises.

Those promises took him close to two years to keep, struggling to use computers against magic until all they'd been able to locate was the orange paint of the town line. Camping out there while Eliot actually _tried_ to punch the barrier he knew was there.

He screamed one day. Got up with his toes to the line, his hands cupped around his mouth, and screamed Emma's name. Henry's. His papa. He screamed for Belle once in a moment of desperation and Hook's when his throat got sore.

No one came and it was the first time he'd let himself cry about everything. Magic always came with a price and he'd thought that bringing his father back meant giving a life for a life. He'd been sure that was it until he'd woken up in Portland, but as they tried and failed to get past his dad's barrier, he wondered if the real price was that he'd never make it home.

"A life for a life," Parker mumbled one night as they sat around the RV Hardison had gotten for the trip.

"I'd be dead if that was it."

"Your life's in there, man," Hardison said and it was so sentimental that it made sense. A storybook twist that wasn't fair. Somehow, he thought dying would have been easier than having a stripe of paint mock him for weeks.

One month in and they were all getting tired. He'd told them time and time again to leave him there, that he'd be fine, but they stayed. They were still there when the first snow hit, flakes coming down, and he was still screaming himself hoarse at the town line. Wondered if he'd stepped over from dedicated to his family to delusional and began to question his sanity when he heard the rumble of a car. Saw that little yellow bug and felt the hope.

Felt the hope that someone had finally heard him.

That Emma had finally heard him.

He didn't know what he'd expected when the doors opened. Had been half-terrified that he'd make it home and have nothing. Had been even more terrified at the thought that it wouldn't be her in the car.

Except, it was. She got out and Henry got out of the passenger side, so much older than he'd been the last time he saw him three years ago.

Henry's face lit up, though, and he ran past Emma before she could stop him. "Dad!" The heart of the truest believer and, later, he'd think Henry was reckless for diving across the town line the way he did, but right then… Right then, he was hugging his son again and Henry _remembered_ him. He knew who he was.

He wrapped his arms around Henry as tight as he could and lifted his son off the ground. He'd gotten so much taller. Grown up so much in the time he was gone. A year when the curse sent him back to the Enchanted Forest. The two years since he had woken up in Portland and struggled to find a way home.

Too much time, he thought as he lowered Henry back to the ground and pressed his face into the teenager's jacket. Too much time.

"Neal…"

He looked up when he heard Emma's voice, unsure and cautious, like she was waiting for him to disappear again. Knew she had every reason to think that and he offered her a little smile, teary as it was. "Hey…"

She didn't move forward to hug him and, honestly, he hadn't expected her to. Not here. Not in front of everyone and not when she was probably still trying to rationalize _how_ he was there.

Henry pulled back from the hug just enough so he could stand beside him, still tucked under his father's arm. "How'd you come back? Mom said..." He trailed off and turned his eyes to his mother, asking her a question she didn't have an answer to.

"I don't know, bud," he told him, his voice soft, as he glanced back towards his friends. They huddled together by the RV, smiling, and he returned it. "Why don't we head back into town, alright? Get some hot chocolate."

"Who are they?" Emma asked, guarded and untrusting eyes on the trio behind him.

"Friends. They helped me get back here," he told her, one arm still wrapped around Henry as he stared at the town line. Anxiety twisted his stomach, scared that he wouldn't actually be able to cross. He hadn't been able to before. He hoped that having Emma and Henry with him would let him get over the line, but they wouldn't know until they tried.

"Helped you?"

"I couldn't find the town. My papa's spell… He knew what he was doing when he made it." He glanced over as Parker appeared on his other side, head tilted as she stared at his son.

"Parker," the thief said simply, straightforward with introductions. "No one's riding a broom."

"Not that kind of magic," he chuckled. He shook his head, still staring at the town line, and his face got serious. "Henry, give me a hand?"

"Yeah?"

"Just…don't let go." He let out a breath, slow and trying to prepare himself as he stepped closer to the line. Henry moved with him, one hand fisted in his father's jacket, and didn't question where he was being led. He knew. Above everything, Henry was smart and he understood the complexities of this place. He needed Henry's help to do this.

They were steps away from the line when Henry stopped moving, though, and called out to his mom. "You gotta help," Henry told her. "You're the Savior." He didn't say the words, but the tone may as well have.

 _Bring him home._

Emma hesitated, her feet frozen against the road until she finally gave a stiff nod and joined them. Their eyes met in some mix of nervous, hopeful, and he thought he saw some anger in hers, but it wasn't the time to bring it up. "Your friends coming?"

"We better be," Hardison said. "Neal promised me mages."

"He's expecting the town to look like something out of Dungeons & Dragons," he told them. Henry laughed, but Emma didn't.

"Eliot wants a magic sword," Parker piped up.

"Eliot doesn't need no more weapons," Hardison argued. "It's dangerous enough when he looks at you."

"Hardison," Eliot growled.

"I ain't lyin'."

Neal shook his head and offered his hand to Emma. "Try?"

She nodded again, just as stiff as she had before, but her gloved hand clasped his. He felt the tremor in it, but he didn't mention it, giving it a squeeze instead.

They stepped over the line as a family and he felt the magic of the barrier wash over him. The rush of magic. The difference in the air. Magic left a certain weight when the levels were high enough and a lifetime of moving between magical and non-magical worlds meant that he knew the feeling. He could practically taste it against his tongue, familiar, and he let out a shuddering breath as he let go of them.

Nothing happened. He wasn't vaulted over the line. The world didn't end. The pain he'd felt coursing through his body as he had lay dying in the woods didn't return. He was safe.

He was home.

He bent forward, his hands on his knees and his head hanging, and just…breathed. Happiness. Relief. He'd made it back. He'd done it.

"Dad?"

He nodded before he straightened up, knowing as he looked at Henry that his eyes looked teary again. "I'm okay."

"You're coming home?"

"Yeah." He smiled. "I'm coming home."

He stayed on the Storybrooke side of the line as Emma went back over and joined his friends in the RV. She drove it over before she got out and headed back to the yellow Bug, careful eyes on him. "Who are you going with?" she asked.

Henry stepped closer to him and he wrapped an arm around his son's shoulders again. "Got room for me in there?"

Another stiff nod and he sighed. They had to talk. He knew that as well as she probably did, even if neither of them had any idea how to begin the conversation about how he wasn't dead. Again. Two years since the day he'd died in Emma's arms, he still didn't know how he was alive. He'd tried to broach the subject with the others, fishing to see what they knew, but Eliot and Hardison had been as oblivious to magic and Storybrooke as the rest of the world. The first inkling they'd had was simply of Parker showing up with him slumped over her shoulder, unconscious.

The one time he asked her about it, her face went darker than he could remember ever seeing it. She had never been one for getting overly emotional, but she had been _angry_. Not at him, he realized, but at someone else. She had looked at him, firm and told him he wasn't allowed to die.

" _That's not how happy endings work. You need to be alive."_

If she knew how he survived it—or if she'd even had a part in it—he didn't think he would ever know. After the first year, he'd learned to let it go and be thankful for what had to be his fifth or sixth chance at life and a new start. He couldn't spend forever agonizing over something, because the one thing he had learned over the years was that magic was unpredictable.

He cast a glance towards Emma as she drove. Not towards the apartment she shared with her parents and not to his papa's pawn shop, he realized. She directed them to a quiet building on the quieter side of an already-quiet town, instead.

"We moved," Henry told him as they got out of the car and Emma went around to tell Eliot where to park the RV. "The apartment got really crowded with us, Grandma, Grandpa, and…" He frowned, suddenly considering something. "…and little Neal."

His brows furrowed. "Little what?"

"Grandma and Grandpa," his son explained. "They kind of named the baby after you."

His eyes widened, surprised and more than a little confused, but he didn't have the time to dwell on it as Parker came rushing past him, a familiar look in her eyes. "I… Hold on. Parker! No stealing!"

"But it's magic stuff," she argued, stubborn.

"That's the point. No stealing. We're not gonna lose you down some rabbit hole because you decided you wanted something shiny."

Her face flickered at the words and his theory about her being from Wonderland gained a little credibility in his mind. Huh.

He turned his eyes towards Eliot and Hardison, pleading. "Control her."

Eliot raised an eyebrow at the same time Hardison laughed. "Ain't no one out there that can control her, man. Not even us." The truth, but he couldn't say he hadn't hoped. The three of them worked off of some kind of private rhythm he had never quite fit into and as he watched Parker situate herself between both men, an arm thrown over either shoulder, he wondered how deep that bond of theirs went.

"Henry, do you think you could show them your book?" he asked when they all moved inside. "Give them an intro?"

Henry stared back at him for a couple seconds before he nodded in understanding. "Sure. It's in my room. We'll just…" He jerked his head down the hallway, motioning for the others to follow. Henry had gotten the hint. He had to talk to Emma and they needed that time to do it in private.

Parker hesitated as the group began to move towards Henry's room and turned on her heel, breaking away from the others. She walked up to Emma, moving a little too far into the other blonde's personal bubble, and leveled her with a look that even he couldn't figure out. "He survived for you," she said plainly. "We didn't have to give him back, but we brought him home, because he's supposed to be here with you. Don't be stupid." She nodded, seemingly satisfied with the one-way conversation that had just happened, and turned, bounding back over to the others. A hand entangled in Hardison's as she looped an arm through Eliot's. "I wanna see the book."

They disappeared into what must have been Henry's room, the door clicking shut behind them, and Neal bit the inside of his cheek, awkward. "Sorry about that. Parker's… Parker."

She turned her head towards him, somewhere between shell-shocked and vaguely disturbed. "That's normal?"

He shrugged a shoulder. "She's a lot better than she used to be," he offered. "She hasn't stabbed anyone in a few years now." The tasers were another matter entirely, but the weekly mini-celebrations of No Stabbing Wednesdays had become as normal as Eliot's spaghetti nights. They took the small victories when they had them and Parker learning how to interact with humans was something to be proud of.

"She stabbed people?"

"With a fork. He deserved it. He was selling guns out of an orphanage," he said. "It was before I ended up with them." The answer came easily, but it wasn't until he'd stopped talking that he realized the casual brush-off of a minor stabbing. Being with those three the last two years had desensitized him to more than he realized. He was going to need to work on that.

Emma nodded slowly, still looking a little lost in the aftermath of that exchange, and sat down on the couch. "So you're…"

"Here. Whole." Mostly. There had been a job a few months after he'd ended up in Portland that had ended with a bullet hole in his side, but that was completely healed over now and not something to worry Emma with. "Don't ask me how, though. I still don't know. Don't think I ever will."

Suspicious eyes turned up to him and she frowned. "You didn't do it?"

"No. When we were…" The words caught in his throat and he sat down next to her, gnawing at his bottom lip. "I thought that was it. I woke up in Portland a week later."

"Maine?"

"Oregon." He saw her stiffen out of the corner of his eye at the reminder of the place they'd met and his hand twitched with a want to reach out. He didn't. "It's where they're based. I was at their place when I woke up," he explained. "Getting things back is kinda what they do."

"They're thieves."

"So am I," he reminded her simply. "You were too."

"I stopped. You didn't?"

"I'm good at what I do."

"At stealing from convenience stores and sneaking into motel rooms."

He chuckled. "I boosted a couple cars too," he reminded her. "You still drive one. And I knew how to steal other stuff. I just wasn't gonna go dragging you into museums to steal anything that high-profile." Her eyebrows went up, inching towards her hairline, and he realized he never told her quite how trained he was in the whole thief thing. He smiled, a little sheepish. "It's…complicated. I liked smaller jobs and it's easier to fly under the radar when you don't have a price on your head in six countries."

"I'm guessing they do?" she asked, casting a significant look down the hallway. There was a hint of worry there as she wondered who her son was alone with and she shifted like she was about to get up.

He reached out for her hand that time, catching her before she could get off the couch. "They're fine. They're the good guys now."

She scoffed softly, disbelieving. "Good thieves?"

"Emma, there's a version of the _real_ Robin Hood out there and you're asking if good thieves can exist?"

Her cheeks flushed and she clenched her jaw. "That sentence shouldn't be a valid argument," she muttered, annoyed

"But it's Storybrooke. It happens. I've been with them the last couple years while we tried to work past the barrier."

"By yelling at it?"

"I couldn't get past it on my own. And it took forever to find this place. It's not like Storybrooke is on a map," he said, defensive. "Something was trying to keep me out. Every time we thought we had it, something went wrong or it wasn't the right part of Maine. I didn't know how to get in through the streets. When we'd come before…"

"We'd been on the Jolly Roger," she finished.

The tension thickened between them at the reminder of the pirate and he let go of her hand to run his through his hair. "Did you and Hook…" He swallowed back the rest of the sentence, not sure if he couldn't speak the words or if he just didn't want to.

"We tried. It didn't work." Something in her face said there was more to the story, but he knew when to leave well enough alone and he let the subject drop with a nod. He wasn't exactly excited to hear the tale of their attempt at a relationship. As much as he was okay with the idea of her finding her Tallahassee with someone else if it made her happy, that didn't mean it didn't make his chest hurt.

"How did you even know I was out there?" he asked her, curious. "I know I was yelling, but I'd been doing it for a month."

She shrugged a shoulder, her eyes down on the floor. "Henry said he felt something out there. He wanted to go check it out." She sighed, pushing her hair out of her face as she looked up at him, that closed off look shifting to something that looked more vulnerable. "Two years," she said, sounding hurt. "You could have called."

"I tried." He reached into his pocket for his phone and brought up the texts before he handed the device over. "That was the only number I had. Hardison couldn't find anything else."

She stayed silent for a minute, scrolling through a long string of texts. She paused to read a few of the longer ones, seeming to scroll past the shorter, until she reached the video he'd sent when he first ended up in Portland. She stopped then, the recording playing through the little phone speaker, and he listened to himself promise that he'd see them again. She swallowed when it ended and pressed the phone his hand, her jaw clenched tight. "I didn't get them."

"I guessed." Even knowing full-well that the messages weren't going through, it had been a comfort. He'd needed that some days.

She nodded, that stiffness from before returning, and let her eyes fall again. "Are you staying here or are you going to leave with them?"

"I spent two years trying to get back, Emma. I'm not going anywhere." His hand touched her shoulder and his face softened when she snapped her eyes up towards him. "I'm not leaving again. Probably doesn't sound like the best promise with my track record, but…" He shrugged a shoulder, offering her a little smile that was supposed to be reassuring. "I always come back, right?"

"Still not that comforting."

"How about I promise to try and stay out of mortal peril?" he suggested. "That better? And if I get in trouble, you can sweep in and save the day."

That got a smile out of her, at least, and his hand slid off of her shoulder, taking her hand in his. "I'm home," he told her firmly. "My family's here. That makes it home." No matter how much he enjoyed his time with the others, they weren't the people he _had_ to be with. They liked having him around, but they didn't need him. They were a little family all on their own and regardless of how they had welcomed him into it, Portland wasn't home. He'd always have a fondness for it, but this… He was _supposed_ to be here.

She stared back at him like she understood and he knew she did. Saw it in her eyes. Felt it in the way she squeezed his hand. She had finally found her home here, found her Tallahassee. Maybe she hadn't found it with a lover, but she'd found somewhere she belonged. Her parents. Their son. Her friends.

Tallahassee had been the two of them grappling for a happy ending. He had been holding on to the values and hopes of his homeland while she had just been looking for somewhere to belong. And they'd found it, even if it hadn't been down in Florida.

A loud laugh echoed down the hallway, sharp and quick in the way Parker did, followed by her voice a second later. "Is Eliot gonna be the fiddle again?!"

The moment broke.

Neal groaned, head dropped back onto the couch. "We're not running a fiddle game, Parker!" he shouted towards them. "Stop planning cons in my kid's room!"

"He doesn't even know how to lift a wallet!" she shouted back.

"That doesn't mean teach him!" Another sharp laugh was his only response and he looked back at Emma, apologetic. "I'm just gonna apologize for that now."

"She's not actually going to…"

"It's Parker," he sighed. "I'm gonna go break it up."

Emma's hand tightened in his when he stood, using the leverage to lift herself up. It propelled her in close and their eyes met, but neither one of them spoke for a few moments. Her hand shifted to tangle their fingers together instead of simply holding on and he felt the subtle shake in her grip.

"Emma…"

She shook her head once, silencing him, but it took another couple breaths for her to open her mouth. "You're staying?"

It wasn't anything he hadn't already told her and he bit back the witty response on the tip of his tongue. Time and place, he told himself. With the nervous way she was looking at him… It wasn't the time to joke. He nodded instead, giving her hand a squeeze. "Yeah."

"You can't keep dying on me." Something in her voice cracked at the end and he felt the guilt wash over him for the pain she'd gone through. "You left. Three times. And you _died_ two of them. I keep trying to let go after and I…" She sighed, but he saw the last word in her eyes. She couldn't move on. She still couldn't even speak the words, too hurt and too broken from everything, but he understood.

He let out a breath before he leaned forward, lips pressed against her forehead for a long second. She sighed, eyes closed and leaning into the touch.

Something rushed between them as he pulled away, his heart pounding in his chest like it had the first time he'd kissed her. She stared back at him with the same kind of nervousness she'd had back then, and he gave her a little smile, reassuring.

"Nothing changed on my side," he murmured to her, his voice low to keep them safe from the listening ears at the end of the hall. Two years before, he'd told her that he'd never stop fighting for her, but that also meant being willing to simply wait. Emma was skittish, running and hiding whenever someone got too close, and he understood that. He respected it. "Whatever you-"

He didn't finish his sentence before she pressed her lips against his cheek. Not a proper kiss—not that the one he'd left on her forehead had been either—but it spoke volumes for Emma and the pace she was setting. Slow. Careful. Her hand never left his and, this time, she returned his smile.

"You're back," she whispered and he thought she was talking more to herself than to him, so he let it go, wrapping his free arm around her when she leaned into his chest.

He kissed the top of her head, eyes staring down at the closed door to their son's room, and smiled. "I'm home."

 _Finally_.

The End


End file.
